Audio version of this post, read by the author

After a long hiatus, I’m hosting a Cartoonist Conspiracy SF meet up next Tuesday in the Mission District.

Cartoonist Conspiracy SF
7-9pm on Tuesday April 8th
Finjan Qahwa coffee shop (3188 Mission St)
All ages, no cover fee (but please buy a drink or pastry)

What’s a Jam Comic?

A comic jam is a creative experiment where multiple artists collaborate to make a comic together. Usually an artist draws a single panel on a sheet of paper, then hands the paper to someone else who then creates the next panel. There’s no script, and each artist can take the comic in whatever direction they want.

To keep the book a little more coherent, I usually like to number the blank pages before the event begins. This means when an artist is drawing the last panel on a page, they need to find the next page and make sure their panel connects the two pages together. So if I’m drawing the last panel on page 5, I need to look at the first panel on page 6 and find a way for my panel to connect the story from page 5 to page 6.

That’s how jam comics are made!

What is The Cartoonist Conspiracy?

The Cartoonist Conspiracy is a meetup for cartoonists to work on jam comics together. Steven Stwalley started the original International Cartoonist Conspiracy in Minneapolis in 2002. I was a regular attendee back in the day, so when I moved to San Francisco in 2005, I knew I had to start a chapter here too.

Cartoonist Conspiracy jam at Muddy Waters in 2007. 2007 flier for SFCC by Mike Hales.

The San Francisco Cartoonist Conspiracy ran from 2006 to 2011 (or so). I started the group and organized the meetings for the first three or four years, but I couldn’t keep up with it on a monthly basis, so other folks took the reins and kept it going longer. Shout out particularly to Brian Kolm and Romy Ilano for keeping the jams going and uploading the comics to the blog and on social media.

Back From The Dead?

There’s no shortage of awesome events for artists in San Francisco. I’ve mentioned the Community Table events at The Drawing Room before, but there are many other great events for artists to choose from. That said, I still think there’s room for a collaborative, storytelling-focused meetup like SFCC. It’s a lot more collaborative than a still life meet-up, and it’s fun to work on sequential storytelling.

There’s also this rad new coffee shop in the Mission called Finjan Qahwa which seems like a perfect fit for a meet-up like this. It’s all ages, free to get in (but please buy a coffee or pastry), well lit, and open late. It really reminds me of the Muddy Waters or the other shops the SFCC got it’s start in.

So we’ll try this meetup on April 8th, and if I have fun, I might do it again. I know that I can’t organize it on my own, so I’m really hoping that other folks can help with organizing in some way (scanning comics, posting on social, etc). But I’m taking it slow for now and just seeing how this one goes.

I have such fond memories from our SFCC meetups and met many of my closest SF friends through these jams. I know there are still a lot of young artists in the city and I hope that some of them can find the same joy from the SFCC that we did back in the day.

The post The Cartoonist Conspiracy of San Francisco appeared first on Doc Pop's Weblog.

The Pacific Northwest Regional Yo-Yo Contest happened this week up in Portland. I couldn’t make it this year, but I heard good things. At one of the PNWR parties, there were some cocktails inspired by classic yo-yo tricks. This included a bourbon and ginger beer drink called “Skin the Gerbal”, named after a trick I created called “Skin The Gerbil”. It looks tasty!

Shout out to the PNWR crew for hosting the event and for honoring one of my tricks like that. I hope I can attend next year and try one of these in person.

The post Skin the Gerbil cocktail at PNWR appeared first on Doc Pop's Weblog.

New world view

I’ve shared a fun new video about how to make fold your own zine or mini-comic from a single sheet of paper. You can watch the video on Youtube or embedded below. You can download my “How to Make A Mini-Comic” comic for free on docpop.org/zine

Thanks to Silver Sprocket for letting me shoot footage in their San Francisco storefront.

The post How to Make a Zine or Mini-Comic appeared first on Doc Pop's Weblog.

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Ghosts in the machine

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I had a blast making this video about enshittification for WordPress.com. It’s a subject my friends are often asking about, so now I can share this explainer video with them. The video is available on Instagram and TikTok if you’d like to drop a or reshare.

View this post on Instagram

A post shared by WordPress.com (@wordpressdotcom)

As I mention in this video, enshittification is when a product starts off great but gets worse over time because a company values profits over it’s users. This can include things like paying creators less, increasing adds, or raising prices for the same service. The term was coined by Cory Doctorow in 2022. In the post, Cory says that companies can get away with enshittifying their products because they know it’s hard for users to switch after they’ve started using a service:

When switching costs are high, services can be changed in ways that you dislike without losing your business. The higher the switching costs, the more a company can abuse you, because it knows that as bad as they’ve made things for you, you’d have to endure worse if you left. – Cory Doctorow

As long as users lack power, companies can get away with this, which is why choosing tools like Mastodon, email newsletters, or building our own websites are the best ways we have to avoid the rot economy.

Platforms enshittify. Protocols deshittify.

Watch my Fediverse Files videos to learn more about how we can take back control of the web.

The post Doc Pop’s Guide to Enshittification appeared first on Doc Pop's Weblog.

/2025/03/06/spring-cleaning.html

I ditched Adobe a few years ago and tried switching to alternative video editing tools. I’ve been happily using CapCut Pro ever since with hardly any issues (other than the upcoming TikTok ban). Things were going well until last week, when I was no longer able to export any of the videos I had worked on. I kept getting an error message saying I needed to pay for CapCut Pro, even though I was already a paid subscriber. Nothing I tried would allow me to access my work, and I haven’t received any replies in the past week from their customer service department.

The Fix:

If you are a paying CapCut Pro subscriber who can’t export your videos, here’s how to fix it without creating a new account:

1. Request a refund from the App Store (Apple users can use reportaproblem.apple.com)
2. Wait for the refund to get accepted (usually between 24-48 hours)
3. Re-subscribe to CapCut Pro
4. Export your videos

A quick search showed many other CapCut Pro users were going through the same issue, but none of us were getting any answers from Bytedance support. A few users were able to fix the problem by creating a brand new account and paying for a second CapCut Pro subscription. That works, but it’s… not a great solution.

So instead, I suggest requesting a refund from the app store you bought it on. Apple users can use this link, Google users can use this one. Once your refund is approved, your CapCut Pro subscription will be canceled, allowing you to resubscribe without creating a second account or paying twice.

A short rant:

I have to complain for a minute. I use CapCut Pro for work and this bug cost me six days of work! Six fucking days of messaging through CapCut’s busted app, emailing capcut.support@bytedance.com, and DMing them on every social network, just trying to regain access to the software I was paying for. I never got a single response, not even a “we’ve received your email” type response.

CapCut is a great tool, but this is a reminder that we don’t own our tools anymore. We only rent them.

If it’s a subscription model, we are always at the mercy of the companies to keep it running. I lost six days of work due to this bullshit, but the same thing could have happened on Adobe or any of the other subscription-based creative services. There are only a few professional editing tools like this out there, and they all do this shitty business model. Even if we pay their subscription fees, we still lose access to the work on our computers because their shitty DRM stopped working.

The post Can’t Export in CapCut Pro Even as a Paid User? Here’s the Fix. appeared first on Doc Pop's Weblog.

I was invited to read some of my comic books at Silver Sprocket last night, along with Cynta Camilia, Connor Brown, and Alex Krokus. Here are a few photos of the event:

Cynta Camlia Connor Brown Alex Krokus after the reading Avi getting the crowd hyped

I had a great time at the event! The other presenters had amazing stories, the crowd was great, and I left feeling really inspired. It was the first reading I’ve done in quite a long time and I think it went really well. I mostly featured stories from The Little Book Of Yo-Yo.

Speaking of yo-yoing and comics, here’s a new video I made about how these two hobbies come together:

The post Some photos from last night’s reading at Silver Sprocket appeared first on Doc Pop's Weblog.

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I’m organizing a photowalk in San Francisco this weekend and I hope you can join us. It’s intended for Fediverse users (including platforms like Pixelfed and Mastodon) to come walk around, take cool photos, and get to know each other better. We’ll be walking around some of my favorite local graffiti and mural spots and taking photos along the way.

We’ll meet up at 2pm at the corner of 24th and Valencia on Saturday March 1st under the awning that says “Catalyze” (see photo), then walk through Osage,

Bring back “social” Media

I organized the very first #Instawalk, a real-world meetup for Instagram users, back in 2010. Instagram was only a few months old at the time, so it was a great way for us new users to get to meet each other IRL. In the following year, IG users started organizing their own Instawalks all across the world. As far as I know, there are still Instawalks happening to this day.

In keeping with that tradition, I’m calling this new meetup a #PixelWalk and hopefully will be sharing our photos on Pixelfed, Mastodon, and other federated platforms as we go. With any luck, I’m hoping other users will start organizing these types events in their own towns.

growing the fediverse through IRL connections

This event is intended as a way for Fediverse users to get to meet each other, but it is open to anyone regardless of which platform they are on. If you aren’t on the Fediverse yet though, I highly recommend you start experimenting with non-corporate social media platforms by creating a Pixelfed (photo-sharing platform) or Mastodon (micro-blogging platform) account. I hope to see you tomorrow!

This is an unsponsored event being organized by a volunteer. I encourage anyone to organize their own PixelWalk wherever they live. I can try to help spread the word, and I’ll do my best to join you if it’s in SF.

The post #PixelWalk in SF: A Fediverse-Themed Photowalk appeared first on Doc Pop's Weblog.

I like to keep an eye out for cool shapes during my walks and use them as inspiration for my #SidewalkFriends drawings. It’s like my version of hunting for Pokémon.

Some moss-filled sidewalk cracks were the inspiration for today’s Sidewalk Friends sketch of a hippopatumus.

Today's #SidewalkFriends sketch: Angry Hippo. Some cracks in the sidewalk inspired this drawing of a hippopotomus.

— Doctor M. Popular (@docpop) 2025-02-23T20:51:20.047Z

The post #SidewalkFriends: Hungry Hippo appeared first on Doc Pop's Weblog.

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In lieu of their typical #BandcampFriday, Bandcamp is donating 100% of their proceeds to victims of the LA Wildfires. You can read more about that here, along with a list of albums and merchandise being sold to also raise funds.

Several independent artists are also releasing benefit albums and compilations, so I thought I’d share a few of my favorites below. Remember, if you buy these albums today (February 7th), more money will go directly to the victims because Bandcamp is sharing their revenue too:

Good Music To Lift Los Angeles:

A 90-song compilation featuring Dirty Projects, K. Flay, Fay Webster, TV on the Radio, R.E.M, Postal Service, and many many more.

Good Music to Lift Los Angeles by Good Music

Los Angeles Rising:

A synth heavy compilation featuring Gary Numan, DEVO, Danny Elfman, and other giants of goth industrial music.

LOS ANGELES RISING by various artists

Musical Aid: a Fire Relief Compilation for the POC Community of Altadena:

Another mega compilation (56 tracks!) featuring new releases Daedelus, Deerhoof, and a bunch of bands I’ve never had the privilege of hearing before. Lots of great tracks on here, though. Funds from this album will go to the GoFundMe pages of displaced POC folks from Altadena. 

Musical Aid: a Fire Relief Compilation for the POC Community of Altadena by Musical Aid: A Fire Relief Compilation

Pulsar Beats 2 for LA 3:

A collection of #modbap tracks by Kypski, one of the pioneers of this style of music. Modular synths and hip-hop instrumentals. I wrote this article about modbap a few months ago that you might also enjoy.

Pulsar Beats 2 FOR L.A. by Kypski

Super Bloom: A Benefit for Fire Relief in Los Angeles

62 tracks from indie rockers like King Gizzard and the Lizard Wizard, Will Oldham, Ben Lee, Dirty Projectors, Guided By Voices, and Ty Segall.

Super Bloom: A Benefit for Fire Relief in Los Angeles by Various Artists

Staying: Leaving Records Aid to Artists Impacted by the Los Angeles Wildfires:

98 freaking tracks of electronic, experimental hip hop. Featuring music by Baths, Daedelus, Odd Nosdam, and Andre 3000

Staying: Leaving Records Aid to Artists Impacted by the Los Angeles Wildfires by Various Aritsts

Music For LA Vol 1 & Music For LA Vol 2:

Two compilations from Helios featuring tracks of previously unreleased material from composers in the ambient, electronic, and modern classical communities such as Baths and Ryuichi Sakamoto.

For LA Vol.1 by Various For LA Vol. 2 by Various

Thanks to Bandcamp and all of the artists!

The post Bandcamp and Musicians Raise Money for Victims Of the LA Wildfires appeared first on Doc Pop's Weblog.

I was a guest on Matt Medeiros’ excellent podcast, The WP Minute. Matt is a great host and has done fantastic with his long-running podcast about WordPress. I was excited to come on and talk about the open web, The Fediverse Files, and my personal evolution from making zines to making art on the web. We kick off the show by talking about how to choose a social media platform that works for you and why you don’t need to focus on the platforms you don’t care about.

I really had a blast talking about this stuff, and I hope that energy comes through. You can watch a video version of the podcast on youtube or find the audio version on TheWPMinute.com. You can also find The WP Minute on the podcasting app of your choice.

sidenote: I had a nice microphone placed in front of me during this podcast, but it wasn’t actually plugged in. So the audio here is actually being recorded from the mic on my laptop instead of my nice mic (or even my airpods). It was a painful reminder to double check my gear before that red light goes on. Even better: have redundancies in place in case your main source fails.

The post A Conversation With The WP Minute About Passion, Social Media, and the Open Web appeared first on Doc Pop's Weblog.

/2025/02/07/six.html

Listen to an audio version of this post read by the author

I recently wrote about some terrible big changes at Meta, like censoring all hashtags related to Democrats and falsely labeling unflattering photos of Trump as AI-generated fakes on Threads and Facebook. The issues don’t just stop at Zuck’s empire, though. Since taking over Twitter, Elon Musk has blocked links to competitors, banned journalists, heavily censored words like “cisgender”, and manipulated the algorithm to match his personal views. Meanwhile, the ban on TikTok, the other major social network, has been temporarily lifted, but it’s unclear how long that will be the case and what major compromises the platform will make to avoid Trump’s scrutiny.

A better Social Web Is already Here:

If it’s not clear yet, now is the time to leave corporate social media behind. Luckily, there are plenty of decentralized alternatives like Pixelfed and Peertube. Today, I’ll walk you through getting started on Mastodon—an open-source, microblogging platform with a thriving community and some fantastic features.

• Community-Driven: no single company or user owns Mastodon
• No Ads, No Algorithms: Your feed is in your control, showing posts in chronological order without corporate interference.
• More Control: Edit your posts, set custom visibility, and use content warnings to shape your experience. It is 2025 y’all, how is “editing your post” still not a core feature on all social platforms?!
• Federated & Interconnected: Follow and engage with users across platforms like Pixelfed and Lemmy, all from Mastodon. Once you experience how amazing this is, you’ll never want to join another social platform that isn’t part of the fediverse.
• Decentralized & Resilient: No single entity can buy or shut it down. If Elon Musk bought a server, folks could switch to other servers without losing any followers.
• Great Vibes: After 17 years on Twitter, I thought finding a real alternative would be tough. But Mastodon’s community is thriving with artists, journalists, musicians, and even yo-yoers. There’s truly something for everyone… except Nazis.
• Stronger Privacy: No invasive tracking or data mining—your posts and interactions stay yours.
• Network effect: Mastodon is part of the open social web, powered by ActivityPub. With integrations across WordPress, Pixelfed, Flipboard, and even Threads (for limited ActivityPub support), the decentralized network keeps growing. Every day, new ActivityPub-powered tools and platforms expand this ecosystem. While Mastodon itself may not be the biggest social network, the broader fediverse creates a massive, interconnected space for online communities.

How to Get Started on Mastodon

1. Choose an Instance

This sounds confusing at first, but choosing an instance is no harder than picking which email client to use or where to host your website. Each Mastodon instance has its own rules, moderation style, and community vibe. Some are general-purpose, while others focus on specific interests like art, tech, or activism. You can browse and compare instances at joinmastodon.org or instances.social.

Don’t worry too much about what instance you join because you’ll still be able to interact with any other instances, and you can always bring your followers with you if you decide to move. I personally like Mastodon.social and would recommend it to new users.

2. Create Your Account

Picked your instance? Great, now sign up and create your profile. You’ll set up your username, add a bio, and upload a profile picture. Your handle will look a little bit like an email handle, with a username in the front and a server name in the back. For example, I’m @docpop@mastodon.social

Please take a little time to flesh out your profile before diving into the next step. Whenever I see new followers, it’s nice to see text in their bio or an image in their avatar; otherwise, I’m probably going to assume it’s a bot.

3. Follow People and Explore

You’ll get the most out of Mastodon by following people and engaging with conversations. Mastodon’s “Federated Timeline” shows posts from across the network, and the “Local Timeline” shows posts from your server, but hashtags are a great way to find users across the fediverse that are interested in the same topics you are. For instance, #Caturday, #graffiti, #accessibility, and #IndieGames are tags that I like to explore. The search function helps you find users, hashtags, and posts.

4. Post and Engage

Whenver I hear complaints about Mastodon, it’s usually from users who sign up and never posted anything. The best way to find a community and get used to Mastodon is by actively posting. Posts on Mastodon are called “toots”, but you can call them whatever the heck you want.

For your first toot, I highly recommend writing a short introduction, including a list of your interests and what you are hoping to get out of Mastodon. Be sure to use the #introduction hashtag in your post too. This makes it easier for other new users to find you, or you can click on the tag yourself and see if you can find some other new users to follow.

Posts can be up to 500 characters long (or more, depending on the instance). You can boost (like retweeting), reply, and favorite posts. There’s also built-in content warnings and post visibility settings, giving you more control over who sees your posts. For instance, you can set a toot to only be seen by your followers, by people specifically mentioned, or by people on your server.

I set all of my posts to public, but I know social media is different for each person. There’s no right or wrong way to share your posts on Mastodon.

5. Customize Your Experience

The easiest way to use Mastodon is through an app. The default Mastodon app is great and available on most devices. Personally, I like to use Ivory for iOS and Mac. OpenVibe is an awesome tool that allows you to post to multiple platforms (like Mastodon, Bluesky, and Threads) and see your feed all in one place. OpenVibe is free and cross-platform.

The biggest advantage of using an app is that you’ll never have to think about signing into different servers. If you are using Mastodon on the web, you might occasionally find yourself on another server, which is basically like being on another website. It can feel disconnected at first, but there are really cool tools like Graze (for Chrome or Firefox), which makes all these different websites feel interconnected. I highly recommend it!

6. Spread the word

Now that you are on the fediverse, it’s time to bring your friends here too. Social is always more fun with folks you know. Remember, if your friends join another federated platform, like Pixelfed, you can still follow each other.

You can ecourage other folks to join Mastodon by sharing a link to your profile, sending them a link to this post, or by sharing any of the great youtube videos on the subject with them. I highly recommend @JenJen@mastodon.art‘s guide to Mastodon for artists!

Have fun!

I love Mastodon, but I remember how confusing it seemed at first. “Servers”, “federation”, and “decentralization” all seemed too complex in the beginning, but these days I don’t even think of them. Plus, I can see how these tools make the open social web much better than silo’d platforms like X or Instagram.

It reminds me of podcasts, which are powered by RSS and not limited to one specific platform. These days everyone understands podcasts, without needing to think about which app they need to use or the open protocols that enable it. In a few years, the fediverse will be as commonly understood as podcasts, email, or the internet.

Today is a great day to take the plunge; try it out, find your community, and experience a healthy new form of social media! Have questions? Drop them in the comments or find me on Mastodon at @docpop@mastodon.social! I’d be glad to help out in any way that I can, but I don’t want to hear complaints about the fediverse if you haven’t been posting, following, boosting, and engaging already.

The Fediverse Files?

To learn more about the Fediverse, like how it works or how to connect your WordPress site to it, please check out the Fediverse Files series I produced for Automattic. Here’s the first episode.

Shout out to @sylv_a@mastodon.social for creating the original image that I used at the top of this post. I modified it slightly for clarity.

The post Global Switch Day: How to Get Started with Mastodon appeared first on Doc Pop's Weblog.

1997

It was the first year I got a CD-RW, Netflix launched a DVDs-by-mail service, the Hale-Bopp comet made an appearance, and I learned about California because of a little group called Heaven’s Gate.

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I tried out Max Miller’s recipe for Bakewell Tarts, but made them as little mini tartlets instead (so I could eat one and freeze the rest and they won’t go bad). I did like them and they are very rich, but maybe I just like the modern recipe better because I found the historical recipe … Continue reading "Mini Bakewell Tartlets"

Cheers, have a gin fizz!

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Listen to an audio version of this long-ass post.

On the day of Trump’s second presidential inauguration, Instagram censored search results for the most popular hashtags associated with American Democrats, like “#Democrat”, “#PresidentBiden”, “#VoteBlue”, “#MichelleObama”, “#Kamala”, and dozens more. This ban lasted for 9 total hours and affected users worldwide, regardless of their content settings. During that same time, Instagram was displaying full search results for “#Republican”, “#Trump”, “#VoteRed”, “#PresidentTrump”, and every other popular Republican hashtag I tried. I found about 50 censored political tags related to Democrats, but every Republican tag was still working fine.

The removal of these pro-Democrat hashtags started on the evening of January 20th, 2025, coincidentally a few hours after Trump signed the “Restoring Freedom Of Speech” executive act. These censored results lasted for about 9 hours, then went back to normal at around 5 am PST. I want to state again that these words were censored for all Instagram users on the website and app regardless of that user’s content settings or their location.

Meta claimed this was a technical “error” affecting hashtags “across the political spectrum,” but this is demonstrably false. I searched through the most popular hashtags used by Democrats and Republicans last night and found that the majority of Democrat terms were being censored, while none of the popular Republican tags were affected. This selective censorship is a scary look into Meta’s updated content moderation practices and its potential alignment with the new administration.

The following hashtags were actively blocked by Instagram on the first day of Trump’s second presidency. While they are now searchable again, I personally confirmed all of these hashtags were inaccessible last night:

And those were just the ones I could find yesterday. I’m sure there are many more. Instagram is still blocking other hashtags like ProChoice, GeorgeConway (a writer critical of Trump), JackSmith (the special counsel against Trump), 14thAmendment, and Drumpf. It’s possible those words were already being censored before Trump’s inauguration, so I didn’t include them on the list above.

During that same 9-hour window, I confirmed the following words were not being censored on IG:

Those words all worked. You couldn’t search for FuckTrump, but you could search for FuckObama or FuckBiden. Trump was searchable, but Biden, Kamala, Bernie, and Obama were not. You could search for MelaniaTrump, but not MichelleObama. PresidentTrump still showed millions of results, while discussions of PresidentBiden were marked as “sensitive content”.

We don’t know what caused Meta to censor these words, but we do know this was not affecting “both sides.”. This was an extremely targeted list of censored words.

As a contrast, I saw several claims on Threads and IG that TikTok was also heavily censoring content. I tested it out for myself and was still fully able to search for words like “Fascist,” “Fascism,” “Democrat,” and “Trump”. I was also able to post pro-Palestinian content like “Free Palestine” without having the post removed. If TikTok is censoring content, they are being more clever about it than Instagram is.

Though we can prove that Instagram was censoring certain hashtags last night, we can’t say why they were doing it. It’s possible this really was a computer error with no human oversight, but I’ve never heard of a computer bug that only affects people based on their political affiliation.

To understand why this happened, take a look at the context surrounding it. Last year, Trump accused Zuckerberg of election interference and threatened to lock Mark up “for life”. After Trump won the election, Zuckerberg started a series of regular visits to Mar-a-Lago for private meetings with the President-Elect. Last week, Zuckerberg announced big changes to Meta’s content moderation team and added Dana White (a Trump loyalist) to Meta’s board. Yesterday, Zuckerberg attended Trump’s inauguration along with Jeff Bezos, Elon Musk, Tim Cook, Sundar Pichai, Shou Zi Chew, and several other of the richest tech oligarchs.

With all of that in mind, I find it unlikely that an Instagram error selectively silencing Trump’s political opponents would coincidentally occur on the first day of his second presidency. Given the state of *gestures broadly at everything around me*, I believe that Meta has many systems in place to quickly silence Trump’s political opponents, and last night we saw one of those systems being used. If Meta really did have an “error” yesterday, it was probably that they activated that system too early.

#Biden #Obama #Kamala #Trump #BarackObama #DonaldTrump #MichelleObama #MelanieTrump #Democrat #Republican #leftist #AltRight #Liberal #conservative #OccupyDemocrats #Maga #VoteBlue #GOP #PresidentBiden

The post The Day Instagram Blocked Democracy appeared first on Doc Pop's Weblog.

Sade

Spent the day painting elf faces before going to the gym It is remarkable that I hate edge highlighting so much, that not only did I decide on a color scheme for the razorwing to procrastinate on it, but I also apparently would even rather paint faces than do edge highlighting. Next thing you know, … Continue reading "Elf Faces"

Maybe Later, a local graffiti artist whose colorful work can be seen throughout the city, recently tagged up the awning above the old Muddy Waters coffee shop on 24th St and Valencia with a giant piece that says “Catalyze”.

The artist also shared a playlist of 9 songs along the southern edge of the awning:

• The Cramps- “You Got Good taste”
• The Pixies- “Isla De Ecanta”
• Dead Kennedys- “Pull My Strings”
• Pinch Points- “Reasons 2 Be Anxious”
• Misfits- “Astro Zombies”
• Mike Sarne- “Hello Lover Boy”
• Dionysos- “Coccinelle”
• The Oh Sees- “Devil Again”
• Homeless Cadaver- “Art. Eat It.”
• Kate Fagan- “Come Over”
• Beastie Boys- “Body Movin”

I’ve created a playlist on Youtube Music of these songs. You can find that here: https://music.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL1g-GXFBtDQc3bYL_OYZNnQGIccS2ujQK&si=–sWsTpiqabM_ikX

Here’s another great piece by Maybe Later on Mission Street.

Fantastic new piece by Maybe Later on the awning of the old Foxy Lady boutique on Mission Street. #SFGraffiti #Graffiti #SanFrancisco #MissionDistrict #MaybeLater

— Doctor Popular (@docpop) 2024-07-06T18:37:16.259Z

The post Maybe Later’s graffiti playlist appeared first on Doc Pop's Weblog.

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I think I finally need to get a new laptop. My old trusty ASUS is 15 years old now, and is getting weird (I suspect hard drive). And then I fired up my “new computer” as a backup, only to find that it is from 2015. So it might be close to time. But I … Continue reading "Computers and Elves"

I’m always on the hunt for new music and have really been loving the music of ShyGodwin. ShyGodwin is a grunge-metal duo from Philly. Their riffs are heavy, and their lyrics get stuck in my head for days. “New Enemies” is a great song to start off with:

Their full discography is available on Bandcamp, and their website, shygodwin.com, is worth visiting too for some weird and retro vibes.

The post ShyGodwin rocks! appeared first on Doc Pop's Weblog.

Thinking Machines

/2025/01/11/christmas-in-hawaii.html

The Night Parade is an annual event put on by Raining Chainsaws in celebration of the winter solstice. Anyone can join, but bright lights and/or puppets are highly encouraged. The parade started in Precita Park and walked down to Dolores Park. I think there were about 600 folks in attendance (just a guess). It happened a few weeks back, but I wanted to share some pics and videos from the event.

The event was a blast in spite of the rain. It was a great way to meet other folks in the community, and it was great to hear how much joy it brought to other folks on the street, many of whom joined for a block or two.

On a separate note, 2024 was one of the deadliest years for pedestrians in the past two decades. Cars are getting bigger, and drivers are less attentive, which makes it suck for going out for walks or grabbing a bite at your neighborhood restaurant. The streets just suck now for everyone outside of a car; hell, the two of us nearly got run over by a car running a red light as we were crossing the street… and we were wearing blinking lights and LEDs, kind of hard to miss you if you are actually paying attention. Cars are killing our city (pun intended), which made this year’s Night Parade feel so special. On the eve of one of San Francisco’s deadliest years for pedestrians, hundreds of friends and neighbors went out for a walk. It felt empowering.

Until we walked back home alone again and remembered how many cars park on the fucking sidewalk in our neighborhood.

The post The Night Parade in San Francisco appeared first on Doc Pop's Weblog.

I had started working on the other minis’ armor highlighting and details specifically to procrastinate on making a decision on how to color bird-guy’s bird (how to color the Skysplinter Assassin’s razorwing). But after 4 elves, I was so sick of armor highlights that I actually painted the bird to avoid more armor. Bird-guy’s bird … Continue reading "Bird-Guy’s Bird"

Producing…

/2025/01/05/home-sweet-home.html

We went up to Humboldt last week to visit family, and had a lot of fun! We only just got back.